GDR2-DAY 10 Lincoln to Stemple Pass and back
Monday Aug 13th, 2018
Start 4560
High pt 6440
Lo pt. 4560
End Elv. 4560
Climbing ~2000'?
Miles 31.4
Total time 4:40
Ride time 3:29
Expecting this day, my last segment of the route in MT, to be a straight forward day. So after a hearty breakfast of pancakes topped with huckleberries, I headed off thru Lincoln to Stemple Pass road. Pedaled through forested "suburban" Lincoln out into some river flats ranching lands. Regain the forest along a pretty stream gurgling and singing to me as I pedal along the upward rolling road. The well maintained gravel roads make the pedaling easy, as many of the early miles are on road treated with a dirt binder to keep the dust down (and makes for a nice firm riding surface). School bus signs dot the way for quite a spell, near modest homes and cabins.
An hour in I am 8 miles toward my expected 15 ish miles. The second hour nets me another 5.25 miles, and presents me with an ominous sign. The route is closed due to the 467 fire!!! While the fire is small, the forest ranger said they moved the fire danger from very high to extreme. Indeed, I later learn that fires are breaking out regularly over wide areas of MT. This has been my fear over the past 2 hazy and smokey weeks, that I might get shutout by a fire again, like Union Pass in WY 2 years ago. So the route is closed; the route leaves Stemple Pass Road and regains the divide near the Marsh Creek headwaters a couple of miles along the divide from Stemple Pass. This is very near the small 467 fire. This is where I was planning to connect the dots of my two GDR trips. Alas, it is not to be.
However, the road to Stemple Pass (and the continental divide) is open so I keep pedaling on. This is a mentioned option that is not quite as challenging as the direct direct route up the forest service road. Three miles of cranking brings me to summit, and it turns out I have connected the dots as this was the start point two years ago!!
Mission Accomplished!! as I have ridden all of the Montana segments from the border with Canada into Idaho.
Just the 70+ mile if Union Pass segment in Wyoming remain to finish the whole route from Canada to Mexico.
While at the pass I chat with a woman commuting to Lincoln (from Bozeman), where she has spent most of the last 6 months working on a film about Ted Kascinski, the Unabomber (film is "Ted K", due in a couple of years). He lived just off a Stemple Pass Road just a few miles outside Lincoln, and she had learned quite a bit from the locals. She gives some hints to the location of his old cabin, and color about his character and local interactions.
We both depart on our seperate journeys, and I start my return trip down the pass. It is downhill for several miles, and I let the bike run, speeding up on steeper sections, only to slow down to an oozing pace at times on the flatter sections. I am like the water in the stream I parallel, letting gravity and nature dictate to me, rather than the other way around. Where it is flatter, willows dominate and I can safely gaze aside, hoping to spot a moose or other wildlife, to no avail. Eventually, I need to pedal to complete my day and Montana portion of my adventure, pedaling back past the cabins and homes, through the ranch land flats, and finally Lincoln .
We celebrate my milestone, and more importantly, Glendas birthday with a night out on the town in Lincoln (pop. ~1700)
While in Lincoln, Glenda and I went to a sculpture garden in a grove of pine trees, with a theme of wood. Timber and logging are a big part of the heritage and current economy, and the garden is an ode to wood, both from a logging and a natural perspective. A good number catch my eye, and the artist has succeeded in making me think at multiple levels. A nice unexpected adder for our visit to Lincoln
